AG INFORMATION SHARED THROUGH SOCIAL MEDIA
Lindsay Mitchell
We’re using social media to reach out to the non-farming public in many fun and interesting ways. We have a Pinterest account, specifically aimed at helping non-farmers find and read articles about the ag industry that might aid in their understanding of your day to day decisions. We have an Instagram account that not only shares fun facts, but also provides a forum for non-farmers to dialogue with farmers and get their questions answered.
(Coincidentally, today is Q&A day on our Instagram account. If you “do” Instagram, get on over there and answer some non-farmer questions!)
And we have a blog (www.corncorps.org) that provides articles very different to what we provide here on our website. These articles help non-farmers understand how you farm, why you farm, and who you are.
Get a taste for how we’re aiding understanding by checking out these articles:
Top Five Answers on Farm Subsidies
And then read through some of a recent post below. You’ll be able to tell right away that this article differs greatly from the informational articles above. With many posts, we hope that non-farmers get a picture of how committed you are to the art of farming and to the way of life. Through no fault of their own, non-farmers just don’t understand what it is to be a farmer – and it’s our job to show them!
Please plug in with your association. Help us to reach out to non-farmers, spread positive information, and turn some of the confusing stuff around.
When one of my friends returned to my town from her new state, new house, and new job, she was telling us how much fun it has been to be out of Illinois. How the taxes are lower. How the schools are better. How the political commercials hit you a little less square in the gut. And she wondered, why would I want to stay in Illinois?
So, I thought about it. And even after I gave her my answer, I thought about it some more. What's holding me here? Why is Illinois important? Why have I lived within a very small triangle of space my entire 38 years on this earth?!
The answer, after much debate and internal soul-searching, is exactly the same answer that came to my gut when she posed the question.
Because I'm a farm girl.
Because that dirt gets under your skin.
Because the rest of your family - even your extended family - lives near.
Because the culture, the mindset, the psyche of a farmer is to stay in one place. To be rooted to the earth. To know - like a deep in your being sort of knowing - the land that you're a steward of.
Farmers can't pick up and move the earth that provides their living. Even the skill set that they've developed, this internal intuition about how to handle every single set back that mother nature dishes out, doesn't necessarily apply to other regions of the country. Every bit of dirt is different, unique, and a farmer is attached to his or her specific piece.
So no, I can't imagine leaving here. I will be a citizen of Illinois - and all the "stuff" that entails - for the rest of my life.
I think Paul Taylor, one of the many farmers I've been privileged to know over my years in our industry, says it best so I'll let you hear it from him. (Start at about 2:45 if you don't want to watch the entire video.)
